Serious Organised Crime Agency
From SR
Roles
The Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) is an intelligence-led agency with law enforcement powers and harm reduction responsibilities. Harm in this context is the damage caused to people and communities by serious organised crime.
Its priorities are:
- To build knowledge and understanding of serious organised crime, the harm it causes, and of the effectiveness of different responses.
- To increase the amount of criminal assets recovered and increase the proportion of cases in which the proceeds of crime are pursued.
- To increase the risk to serious organised criminals operating in the UK, through proven investigation capabilities and in new ways.
- To collaborate with partners in the UK and internationally to maximise efforts to reduce harm.
- To provide agreed levels of high quality support to SOCA's operational partners and, as appropriate, seek their support in return.
SOCA is responsible for dealing with financial information concerning suspected proceeds of crime in order to counter money laundering
The SOCA Board has determined that SOCA should aim to apportion its operational effort broadly as follows against the main threat sectors:
- drugs trafficking, primarily Class A - 40%
- organised immigration crime - 25%
- individual & private sector fraud - 10%
- other organised crime - 15%
Much of this effort will be deployed working with or supporting operational partners. The Board has further determined that SOCA should aim to devote broadly 10% of its operational effort to supporting law enforcement partners in support of their objectives when those objectives would not otherwise be SOCA priorities.
Funding
SOCA is an Executive Non-departmental Public Body sponsored by, but operationally independent from, the Home Office.
